Temperature-dependent thermal expansion of cast and hot-pressed LAST (Pb–Sb–Ag–Te) thermoelectric materials

Abstract

The thermal expansion for two compositions of cast and hot-pressed LAST (Pb–Sb–Ag–Te) n-type thermoelectric materials has been measured between room temperature and 673 K via thermomechanical analysis (TMA). In addition, using high-temperature X-ray diffraction (HT-XRD), the thermal expansion for both cast and hot-pressed LAST materials was determined from the temperature-dependent lattice parameters measured between room temperature and 623 K. The TMA and HT-XRD determined values of the coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) for the LAST compositions ranged between 20 × 10−6 K−1 and 24 × 10−6 K−1, which is comparable to the CTE values for other thermoelectric materials including PbTe and Bi2Te3. The CTE of the LAST specimens with a higher Ag content (Ag0.86Pb19Sb1.0Te20) exhibited a higher CTE value than that of the LAST material with a lower Ag content (Ag0.43Pb18Sb1.2Te20). In addition, a peak in the temperature-dependent CTE was observed between room temperature and approximately 450 K for both the cast and hot-pressed LAST with the Ag0.86Pb19Sb1.0Te20 composition, whereas the CTE of the Ag0.43Pb18Sb1.2Te20 specimen increased monotonically with temperature.